A Father's Stake

She got his meaning. “I’m used to walking,” she said, “so don’t worry about it being too rough.”

“Good to know,” he said, but she didn’t miss his slight suggestion of a smile.

She fell in step with him, skipping a bit to keep up as they went around the house. “Is your horse okay back there?”

“Gizmo? Sure, he’s a patient sort,” he said, giving her a look with his dark eyes.

Grace almost missed her step, but managed to keep up with Jack as they headed toward the massive pines. As they got closer, she noticed a worn path that cut through the stand.

Jack motioned to it. “This way,” he said.

She hurried after him into the dim light of the woods, the silence broken only by the muffled sound of their feet stepping on the spongy layers of fallen pine needles. The scent of earth and pine was pleasant as they made their way without speaking. Then the light began to get brighter through the lacing branches, and they headed up a rise that Jack took easily. At the highest point, she realized they’d changed direction somewhere along the line. They were facing directly west, she thought, the sun behind them, and she got a good idea of the way the mountains almost circled the lowlands.

She motioned to the rolling brown land slightly below them, the trees much more sparse here. “What is this?”

“A small part of the...of your ranch and some of the best grazing land this area ever saw.”

There was no trace of anything in the brown earth an animal could graze on. “But, it’s dead.”

He exhaled harshly. “Looks that way.” She thought for a moment the cryptic comment was all he was going to say. “This was the way my grandfather found it when he came down from the Rez to make a home here,” Jack said at last. “Dead. Nothing growing. But he worked all this land, building it from nothing, until it was able to support sheep and cattle and his family, all seven kids. He was known for his breeding stock, and this grazing land was the best in the area.”

His eyes never met hers, but stayed on the land sprawling out ahead of them. “What happened?” she asked.